Pre-Europeans death camp number 1:

Crystal Palace February 6th-7th.

I honestly do not think that I’ll get used to 4:45 wake ups, ever! After boarding the coach at 5:30, I passed out for the first few hours, and I couldn’t for the life of me tell you what happened in that period of time. But after our service stattion stop, we all perked up a little, and by the time we hit London you wouldn’t have thought we’d woken up so early … well for the most of us anyway.

After arriving at Crystal Palace we had about 15 to get our rooms sorted, and get ready for a s&c session, and 2 pool sessions. However, knowing that as soon as we got ourselves sorted we could have lunch (which btw, was lovely) I was ready in 5 minutes.

So, after eating my lovely meal, we made our way to the pool for s&c. It was mainly core stuff, and wasn’t too bad, at the time (I did however, feel it the morning after). Then, after running through the session with Nick, we headed for the pool. A 2 hour sessions consisting of swimming, passing, shooting (or in my case, being shot at) and then for the last 5 minutes or so, we ran through the defence we would be practising in the next session.

After our half an hour break, we warmed up, and went straight into practicsng our new defence (pressing into full drop or half drop)… we got it well enough. We thought. But after another half hour break, we started playing the London Penguin team, just a friendly so we could pratise, but they started to drive our defence out and we realised that maybe we need more practice.

How delighted I was to find that we didn’t have to be at the pool till 7. LIE IN! (yes, I am that sad).
So after a good meal, and a good sleep (which were both need after a day consisting of 3 pool sessions and a s&c session, as well as waking up in the early hours) we got really stuck into practising that defence.
After about an hour warm-up we started practising again and again and again, until it was perfect. For the last hour of the session all we practised was pressing into zone, pressing into zone.

By 9 o’clock we were all tired and hungry, knowing we were getting a cooked breakfast we all pretty much ran back to the lodge (it was SO worth it).

Back to the pool for 10, this time a bit more on attacking, as well as the defence, playing with the second centre forward, we the clearing out drive from 2 or 4. And by 12 o’clock we had it, we were talking to each other all the time, we knew what was going on.

And after a sandwhich, and some jaffa cakes for lunch, when Penguin turned up at 1, we were all ready.
You could tell. They hardly scored … infact they didn’t score once when I was in goal, thanks to my defence (however, I’ll take a little credit). Even though we were all tired, and needed our beds, we were working together and all our hard work that day showed.

But I must admit when 3 o’clock came, I was looking forward to getting home. However, I didn’t get home until 1 o’clock this morning. And my parents still made me go into school. All I could help thinking was… ‘I should be being paid for this’. And thanks to Sports Aid and ASDA, I guess I kind of am.

Pre-Europeans Death Camp 2:

February 15th-17th. And boy am I looking forward to it.

Pre-Europeans Death Camp 2:

15th – 17th Feburary – St. Athens

3 days – 14 hours pool time, 4 and a half hours S&C.

And I didn’t even get the weekend before to rest.

From Friday 12th to Sunday 14th… I was playing for the North West A team. Friday was just a training session, in Manchester. But the Saturday and Sunday was the interregionals tournament, in Walsall.
North West A won, after a very grilling final against the North West B team… (yes, the north west really IS that good, haha ;)).
I got two clean sheets, and got picked for the all star team at the end (which is the best seven players… six outfeild and one goalkeeper). Then we finished with the compulsary throwing in of our coach. :)

However, the water polo wasn’t over. We then took the 3 hour drive down to Cardiff… it probably would have taken less time but once again Jo’s sat nav was wrong. We all stayed overnight at the Holiday Inn by the airport. Then the next morning it was up for 9 breakfast and to the RAF camp for 11.

The 3 days weren’t actually as bad as Crystal Palace, it was more spread out, and we got long rest periods. Plus, the food was AWESOME!
Everyone was pretty tired by the third day. You could tell.
But our coach gave us a talk about it being the most important time of the tournament and we’d all feel tired. But this is were it really counted… it really helped.

We also played Bristol and kicked their ass! :)